Chinese refurbishment of Prince Phillip 'poses no security risk'

The contract to refurbish Prince Phillip has been awarded to Chinese telecommunications giant Huwei, it was confirmed yesterday, despite ongoing security concerns about the company's links to the Chinese government.

'With major infrastructure projects we have a duty to the taxpayer to keep costs down' said a UK treasury spokesman. 'Our Chinese partners offered best value, and were the only bidder to think of adding a satellite dish to His Royal Highness. That's just the kind of innovation we were looking for to keep the monarchy relevant in the 21st century'

The Prince 2.0 project will see Phillip's major components replaced with more reliable plastic and titanium parts, before he receives improvements such as a built-in abdominal mp3 player, wrist mounted corgi dog whistle, and an elbow cigarette lighter that plays "Greensleeves".

Huwei are adamant that the future cyber consort will not be used for intelligence gathering at the highest level of the UK state. 'No, the Chinese government is not interested the Duke's pillow talk with the queen' said a spokesman. 'The things they discuss are just too dull. Take the conversation they had in the bedroom of Windsor Castle on 15th May at 12.13am - horses running in the 'ipsom darbee'. Boring, Boring, Boring. No use to the Red Army at all.'

However, the Huwei spokesman conceded there may have been some external interference with the specification for the robo-royal. 'Whoever heard of putting slitty eyes on an old Greek man?' he said. 'Is this some sort of joke?'